Analysis of “Walking the dog” by Bernard Mac Laverty
Often society can be a weird entity. It can abuse its power, and make its citizens scapegoats. Often people tend to be naïve and believe in what society tells them, but what happens when society is no longer governed by people with justice and sympathy? In Bernard Mac Laverty’s “Walking the dog” (1994), Mac Laverty is capable of lighten this problem. In the story, Mac Laverty is trying to show that when citizens do not respond to society’s challenges, they become dogs on a leash for a minor group of people who abuse their power to stand their ground. The story lightens the way people should stand their ground and become independent of society’s leash. The short story starts in medias res, as the main character, John Shields, leaves his house to walk his dog, on a normal evening just at the beginning of the nine O’clock news. To add is the environment described very naturally with no subjective opinions or inputs. The language is very informal, and there is used slang, such as “C’mere” and “Aye, mebby” which indicates that they are living in Northern Ireland. In addition, the language is neutral and does not have any indirect opinion to the story, consequently no positive or negative loaded words, which makes the language simple. The story is told by a third person narrator, which has a limited point of view. The narrator is neutral in the way that it has no opinion towards the events, and the characters are described indirectly by what they say and do. This gives the reader a chance to have its own opinion towards the story because it is not decided on forehand. The use of direct speech in a slang like way characterizes the narration and makes the story reliable because the reader can identify itself in the characters. In the text, John says “C’mere you”. The